


Kosher

by yuletide_archivist



Category: Lamb - Christopher Moore
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2003-12-22
Updated: 2003-12-22
Packaged: 2018-01-25 06:17:07
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,020
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1636016
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/yuletide_archivist/pseuds/yuletide_archivist
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
      <p>Written for Chloe</p>
    </blockquote>





	Kosher

**Author's Note:**

> Written for Chloe

 

 

"Kosher" 

The first time I saw the Savior after he died, he hit me in the mouth. 

"Dickhead," said the Prince of Peace. 

But maybe I'm getting ahead of myself. 

The angels had released Maggie and me to go out into the world, but they hadn't told us what to do. Fortunately, there was still some money left over, even after the hotel bill was paid. I mean, we are two 2,030-somethings, we don't exactly have much in the way of marketable skills in the modern world. There didn't seem to be a call for professional mourners anymore, so that dream was long gone. There was the village idiot thing, but to make any money at that, I'd have to go into politics. 

The need to "catch up" with Maggie--two thousand years, people--was balanced by the need to get out and see the world. (Okay, so we were not exactly cogent for all of that time, but do you think I'm going to pass up an excuse like that to get laid?) Even with the forays Raziel and I had made in the previous few weeks, we were both feeling more than a little stir crazy after spending months in a hotel room and two millennium in the ground. 

We were also both eager to see Josh's impact had had on the world, how he was worshipped, and how much of his message had gotten through from the hit-and-miss retelling of his story in the Bible. Sure I'd been out, but I didn't really get the feel for what people had to say about him. There'd been more than one prophet standing on the street corner screaming about the end of the world when we went out, but as the Torah says, "The whacked out you shall always have with you." (Malcontents 1:23) 

So one morning Maggie and I decided to go to church. We chose one which we'd passed on our various explorations of the city; it had a marquee out front that said "Worship at 7:30 and 9:00am, Sundays." I particularly wanted that church because it was large and impressive--and it was right next door to a bagel shop. Wonderful idea, bagels. They're all bready and chewy and they go great with fish. And I still seemed to have the knack for multiplying, so I always kept a spare bagel in the room, in case of emergencies or company dropping in--not that a lot of company drops in on two people who have been dead for as long as we had been--but you never knew when you'd need bagels for twelve. 

I also chose that church, though, because of the name: St. Bartholomew's. I loved the idea that my old friend and mentor had churches named after him, and I wondered how many dogs there would be inside. I also scanned the Community Activities board in the lobby for classes on how to lick your own balls. (I didn't see ball licking explicitly mentioned, but I am hopeful that they were just being discreet.) 

I didn't make it through the service. Actually, I didn't even make it _to_ the service. Because I saw it as soon as I walked in, hanging on the wall behind the altar like some gruesome poster in a teenager's bedroom. 

It's not that it looked so much like him; it barely looked anything like him. The face was too long, the skin far too pale, the eyes the wrong color--it was not Josh. And you'd think that I've seen enough crucifixions that someone who was clearly not Josh wouldn't bother me so much. But I looked at that face, upturned in pain, and I could hear Josh moan. I saw those feet, nailed and bloody, and I could feel the drops of blood fall on my head. I saw the spear wound in that side, and I heard Josh scream. 

We walked out. I haven't set foot in another church since then, and I have no intention to. 

We tried watching some of those religious services they show on television, but quite frankly, many of them were creepy. Some of them were so serious, it hurt. Sure, gaining the Kingdom, Savior of the World, blah blah blah, none of it's really the stuff which stand-up is made of, but come on! They were all so somber and serious, they made Gaspar and the monks look like comedians in the Catskills. (It was good to learn that, after doing all that wandering for thousands of years, we finally put all that practice with traveling and kvetching about the trip into something lucrative like the comedy club circuit.) 

The way a lot of these guys talked, you'd never have known that Josh ever laughed or farted or used sarcasm in an unauthorized manner. Maybe it's something that wouldn't have bothered me if I hadn't known him; the fact that Moses never seemed to have much of a sense of humor didn't bother me. But I never watched Moses try to teach an elephant yoga, either. 

The other televangelists weren't much better. There were the too somber ones--then there were the too happy ones. The Pharisees might have told you you were sinning and should be stoned, but at least they weren't generally smiling when they did it. 

I'm not even going to talk about the one woman with the pink cotton candy hair. She was just scary. 

One morning, about two weeks after the angels left us, I woke up to find that Maggie was gone. On her pillow was a note: 
    
    
         Biff--Josh called. He wants me to go out and see the 
         world on my own and I think that's a good idea. I'll
         be back.
    
         Love,
         Maggie
    
    

I was devastated. Maggie was my first love, my one real love, and we always seemed to be getting away from each other. At the same time, though, I wasn't surprised. Oddly, my only thought, as I tried not to think about the ache inside where the empty space that was Maggie always seemed to be, was that if Josh had called I hope it hadn't been collect. That would be one hell of a phone bill. 

Three days later, I the Son of God cold-cocked me. 

I'd been sitting on the bed, feeling sorry for myself because Maggie had left, not particularly inclined to go out exploring at the moment. Just as Judge Judy was telling off some woman for letting her boyfriend steal her dog again, there was a knock on the door. 

A few seconds later, from my vantage place on the floor, I was able to get a good look at Josh. He looked different. Okay, so 2000 years can change anyone, and I'd never seen him in a Hawaiian shirt and Bermuda shorts before. But he looked...older, didn't seem quite it. Nor did more serious. Colder. More distant. Less like Josh. 

He was also the best thing I'd ever seen. And he could still hit surprisingly hard. 

"That's the way you say hello?" I was expecting a hug, or at least a "Hi, Biff," not a good right cross. 

He just stood and looked at me, then helped me up. We went and sat on one of the beds together. 

And sat. And marinated in the awkward silence for a while. What do you say to a guy you haven't seen in two millinnium? 

"So," I said casually, casting back to my reading of the Bible and something I had wondered, "that Paul guy really that much of a nimrod?" 

Josh looked at me for a second. "Yeah. And he cheats at gin." 

More awkward silence that stretched like an Indian fakir after too long a time between yoga sessions. 

"You shouldn't have done it," Josh said quietly. Oblique as it was, I knew what he was talking about. Kinda hard not to, considering what happened the last time we saw each other. And Maggie had said he'd been upset. 

"I told you I'd come back. Why didn't you trust me?" Josh sounded more hurt than I could ever remember him being. And that included the time my elephant sat on his foot. 

I looked at the bedspread. I studied the bad painting of a field of daisies over the bed. I found an old copy of "Woman's World" someone had left in the room suddenly fascinating. 

Josh didn't say anything, just waited. And radiated hurt. He was good at both. 

"It's amazing what you can do with a pork roast and 7-Up," I said. 

"Screw the roast!" Josh had moved from hurt back to pissed off pretty quickly. 

"I'm pretty sure there's a law against that. Or is this another bacon thing?" 

"I'm serious, Biff." He got up and started pacing. Josh was always good at pacing. He could pace anywhere. Snow, a pit, a nook in a mountain, water. You name it, he could pace on/in it. 

I was working on a wry and witty come back, to try and lighten the mood. "You left." Not what I meant to say. 

Josh stared at me for a second and then sat down next to me. "I came back." Well, in for a penny, in for a buck twenty. 

"But you were gone. And I felt that you were gone. And they didn't just take you. You ran to them!" 

"You shouldn't have killed yourself!" 

"Look who's talking!" I had been so angry, and really, I still was. Because no matter how long it had been for the world, it was just a few months for me. It's not like I'd been lying underground, playing solitaire all this time. I was just out. Gone. And everything that had happened, that last day, might as well have been yesterday, for all it felt like to me. And there'd he'd been, thinking he had to die, to prove some point to his father, to cleanse the world or something, and I had to watch and I was just supposed to wait around like he was just going outside to take a leak? Who did he think he was? 

So I kissed him. 

And it wasn't the Kiss of Peace or the Kiss of Forgiveness or the Kiss of your Aunt Martha or anything remotely nice or spiritual or something between best pals. It was full-on tonsil hockey. 

Kissing the Son of God was completely different from kissing anyone else I'd ever known. I've kissed lots of people. I've kissed courtesans and prostitutes, friends and relations. People I liked, people I was only okay with. And one person I had really loved. But this was different than all of them, and it was exactly like all of them, which is part of what made it so different. It was contentment and excitement. It was like having a thousand orgasms all in the space of a second, then another thousand in the next. It was like having the back of my head blown off by a rocket. I didn't just see stars, I saw entire universes gliding through time and I was a part of them all and finally understood them all. This was the enlightenment that Gaspar talked about, the key to eternal life Balthasar searched for, the way to be a Brahma that Melchior strived towards. This was the Divine Spark. 

He wasn't bad. A bit too much drool, but he was new to this, so I was willing to forgive it. 

After a minute, Josh pulled away slightly. "No," he whispered. 

I wasn't about to let him get away now, though, so I pulled him back into a kiss. 

I don't know why I wasn't bothered by all of this. I never thought of myself as one of those funny disciples. I know gay isn't looked at as a bad thing, necessarily, anymore, but there was plenty of it going around back in my day and I never found myself wanting to sneak around the city wall and go play Hide the Scroll with John. Maybe all of this was because I'd known Josh for so long, or maybe it was just that I hadn't been laid in twenty centuries and Maggie and I had only really spent a few days together. Maybe, just as it was with so many things, it was just because it was Josh. 

I spent most of my life being With Josh. Not just doing things with him, but being with him. I had always chosen being with him over nearly anything else I might do. I'd even chosen to go with him across the world to places I'd never even heard of, rather than stay and be friends with Maggie. And, in that moment, I realized that rather than stay in a world that had Maggie in it, I had chosen to leave a world that didn't have Josh. Maybe that said something. 

Possibly, it said everything. 

Also? I'd seen Josh calm homicidal maniacs with a touch of his hand. His tongue was even more talented. Now, if I could just keep him from moving away. 

"Biff, I can't," he said, sounding not at all happy about it. 

I tried to kiss him again, but he stood up this time. 

"No! No sex, remember." He was sounding firm in that way that meant he knew he was supposed to be firm about this, but didn't want to be. Or was too firm in other areas, if you know what I mean. 

"What? That was a long time ago, Josh. You know, when you were alive the first time? I'm sure God didn't mean, like, never ever. Besides, no parent wants to think of their child having sex." 

"Yes, I'm pretty sure he meant never ever." Josh sounded greatly annoyed, I'm assuming at his father. 

"Anyway, all he said was that you weren't to know a woman. Now get back here." 

"I'm pretty sure this was covered," Josh said, though his resolve seemed to be slipping. He even sat back down next to me. Might have had to do with where my hand was. Hey, if he'd been that serious, he would have paced away. 

"Nope," I mumbled between kisses. "Not a woman. Really. You can check if you like." I was kind of impressed with how well I could talk at this point. Only a couple of minutes into his direct education on the subject and Josh was already improving by leaps and bounds at the kissing thing. 

From somewhere, Josh seemed to finally pull together his determination and pushed me away firmly. "No." Dammit. "It's...I'm sorry." And he really did sound it. 

I hadn't been this disappointed since Maggie said she was going to marry Jakan. "So. Not like bacon?" 

"Afraid not." 

"Sure?" 

"Yes. I am sure that molesting the Son of God is not like eating bacon." 

"Hey! Whose tongue was that down my throat a few seconds ago? Sure wasn't the Holy Ghost's!" 

"I'm sorry," he said again. 

I sighed. Why should anything with Josh be easy? "So, what are you doing back? And why did you bring me back after all this time?" 

He suddenly changed again. He'd changed to that Josh-not-Josh look. "Father's been pushing me to do something. He wants me to come back." 

Uh-oh. "I'm assuming that's not good." I'd watched some movies on cable. The Second Coming was not anticipated as a love fest. 

"No. It pretty much means the end of the world." 

What can you say when you're informed that the Apocalypse is nigh, and it's not the crazy guy down at the bus stop telling you, but your best friend, who you know can actually do that kind of thing? 

"Oh." That was pretty much all that came to mind. 

I looked at him. Really studied him. I realized what that Josh-not-Josh look was: he looked ancient and distant, and I could see thousands of years of sadness etched into his face. I might have spent the last eon mouldering, but Josh had spent it watching people, watching the world--but not a part of it. And watching his message get ignored, and worse, distorted to justify the worst things about humanity: War. Prejudice. Bingo halls. 

Disciples Josh had aplenty. Worshippers and yes men, opponents and nay-sayers. What he didn't have was a friend. 

"Why?" I suddenly said. 

Josh blinked and was more Josh than not-Josh. "What do you mean, why?" 

"Why does it have to mean the end of the world? Remember, all the Jews thought when the Messiah came, he was going to overthrow the Romans. But that's not what you did. Why does this time around have to be any more what people think it is than the first time? And if Revelations wasn't written under the influence of something major, I don't know what was, so I have no idea why you would follow it." 

"I'm not basing this on Revelations or a Hollywood movie, Biff. This is coming straight from the top." 

"So, you've defied your dad before. You were always good at chewing him out!" 

He looked away. "That was a long time ago. And I wasn't alone." 

"You're not alone now." Did I volunteer to chew out God? Okay, now I was terrified. But I wasn't about to take it back. 

And, for the first time since he'd come into the room, Josh smiled. Really smiled. The one that glowed in the dark. "I know." 

He came back to the bed and took my hand as he sat down. I had a strong urge to jump him, but that quickly passed. Okay, not completely, but I controlled it. "Before I do anything, I want to walk around again. I need to talk to people, experience things. Get to know what the world is like again from ground level." 

"So, where are we going?" Deja vu. 

"Well..." His smile widened as he stood up and walked to the door. And never let go of my hand. "Have you been to Disney World yet...?" 

 


End file.
